Letters to the editor, 2001
TOPIC:  Energy plan
May 2001

Dear Editor

In reference to the Bush Administration's proposed energy plan:  The debate is involving politicians, fossil fuel and nuclear energy industry representatives and environmental groups.  Where are the citizens in the debate?

In the late 1970s, the Swedish government opened the debate about a national
energy policy to any Swede who participated in a 10-hour workshop on energy
choices.  More than 2% of the population took part, equivalent to 2 million
U.S. voters participating in discussions.

Here at the Center for Creating the Future, a think tank based in Fort
Lauderdale, we have gathered viewpoints from across the spectrum of the
energy debate.  We invite your readers to visit
www.creatingthefuture.org to
inform themselves.  The debate should include the people who will live next
to the proposed new power plants, so the time to get involved is now.


Jack Latona
The Center for Creating the Future
[email protected]
www.creatingthefuture.org
Fort Lauderdale, FL   USA
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Sent: Saturday, June 16, 2001 11:30 AM
To: Letters, sun sentinel

Subject: live-work development

To the Editor:
   I want to congratulate Alan Hooper and the City  of Fort Lauderdale Community Redevelopment Agency for moving forward with development of a live-work project in Flagler Heights. Among other benefits, live-work arrangements will lead to a
smoothing out of rush-hour traffic at no expense for road improvements. We don`t need to give up our downtown offices, just do some work at home in the morning or late afternoon and avoid the rush hour. The future of traffic improvement lies in smarter thinking, not more large-scale road projects.

Jack Latona
The Center for Creating the Future
[email protected]
www.creatingthefuture.org
Fort Lauderdale, FL   USA
See this page about the Filioque dispute

When will the word "Filioque" be used only in discussions of history, not to arouse sentiments of readers and to divide communities?

www.economist.com

To the Editor:                                           12 August 2001

The Center for Creating the Future thanks you for publishing the interview
with Bjorn  Lomborg.  It has been difficult to find such information in
mainstream sources. Unfortunately, most liberals (in your sense) have left
these facts to the right wing to misuse. 
The Center for Creating the Future has a Julian Simon Award and we will be pleased to award it to Lomborg for this year.  It is a sad commentary on academia and the media that Simon's death went largely unnoticed while Paul Erlich and his ilk remain "experts".

The Center believes that the doomsayers have always been wrong: Malthus, The Club of Rome, today's anti-globalists, etc.  That's not to say that the
issues they raise are not of concern, they are, and that's where we differ
from the Right. The point is that we have successfully dealt with all these
threats thus far and there is no reason to believe we will not continue to
do so.  In fact, giving in to the Luddites, the solution usually put forth
by these scaremongers, is the only way we might end up fulfilling their dour
prophecies.

submitted to [email protected]

Click here to read about Julian Simon
Transportation ... Air transportation....
To the Editor:                            Sept. 2001

The Sun-Sentinel published two articles on Sunday, September 9, that elaborated on two of the key issues facing U. S. and local transportation: over-dependence on the automobile for ground transportation and the increasing demand for air travel.  The Center for Creating the Future,Inc., a Fort Lauderdale based think tank has had several meetings on the future of transportation and is presently conduction a study for Broward County on the future of parking in our county.  The problem is a simple one to state: more people wanting to go more places more quickly.  Your aviation writer, Ken Kaye, is correct, longer runways are not the biggest consideration concerning bigger (up to 1,000passengers) jets: it�s the ramps and gates that will need to be enlarged and the terminals, parking, and access roads as well.

Just as with our highways, much of this is due to peak hour congestion: everyone wants  his or her plane to leave at just certain times: early, mid-day, and the end of the business day, just like rush hour on the roads twice a day.  We spend enormous amounts of capital to deal with these peak hour logjams.  Imagine Toys-R-Us hiring the same number or sales people in June as December.

James Fallows has written a book, Free Flight, advocating a dramatic reconfiguration of air travel from the hub-and-spoke system now in use, to a widely dispersed, point-to-point system. It is, however, hard to imagine we will turn away from the huge capital investments, public and private, in present facilities and equipment and those which are planned, for a totally different arrangement.  Nonetheless, new ideas are always valuable, they keep us thinking.

Similarly, while virtually all transportation planners are urging much greater use of public transportation, it appears unlikely we will pry very many fingers off of steering wheels in the near future.  Public transportation will, instead, primarily serve those who cannot drive: the elderly, the poor, and the disabled.  Only when the critical mass of population gets overwhelming, a point we�re not close to in South Florida, (see New York or Los Angles for real traffic �and still, most people there choose to drive), will most people change their auto-erotic behavior.

Much more could be written, but thanks to the Sun-Sentinel for bringing these issues to public attention.
Letters to the editor, 2002
Date: Mon, 17 Dec 2001 12:31:56 -0600
To: [email protected]
Subject: To Chris Dodge

Chris Dodge
Utne Reader
Librarian
[email protected]

December 15, 2001

Dear Mr. Dodge

In addition to magazines, you should direct your readers to web
magazines and web sites. In addition to the skeptical magazines you
listed in the recent edition, you should have mentioned www.randi.org
<http://www.randi.org/> , which carries Swift, a  web-zine, edited
weekly by James Randi, famed debunker of the paranormal.

Most of your readers probably don't want to visit our site,
www.creatingthefuture.org <http://www.creatingthefuture.org/> ,  where
we recently awarded the Chicken Little Award to Paul Ehrlich and the
first annual Julian Simon Award to statistics professor Bjorn Lomborg of
Denmark.  We are, nonetheless, long-time readers and refer our readers
to the Utne Reader as a valuable resource

.Jack Latona
The Center for Creating the Future, Inc.
201 SE 12th Street
Fort Lauderdale, FL  33316
(954) 523-8899
E-mail:  [email protected]
Web:  www.creatingthefuture.org


REPLY


Jack Latona, thanks for your suggestions and information.  I've shared word of Swift already with the Utne Reader online staff.

With good wishes engaging the public in public policy making,

Chris Dodge, Librarian               
Utne Reader, LENS Publishing Co.        Phone:  (612) 338-5040      
1624 Harmon Place, Suite 330            FAX:    (612) 338-6043  
Minneapolis, MN  55403  USA             E-mail: [email protected]

Utne Reader Online: http://www.utne.com
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